New Delhi: A parliamentary committee has expressed concern over posts of scientists in the Department of Health Research (DHR) lying vacant for an “unacceptably” long time and the continued exodus of trained and talented Indian professionals to developed countries. The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health and Family Welfare, in its report presented in the Rajya Sabha this week, recommended urgent measures to address the issue, adding that the practice of contractual appointments be stopped to prevent desertions.
To curb the trend of brain drain, India must enhance higher education options, research infrastructure and funding and improve standards of living and stipends of scientists, possibly with the involvement of the private sector, the panel said in its report.
Skilled Indian professionals should be encouraged to return from abroad and undertake domestic health research projects, it added.
“A unified and long-term approach is essential for India to retain and recover its most valuable asset, human capital,” it said.
The DHR’s efforts to fill up the vacancies created in 2017 for specific roles within the department have been in vain, the panel said.
“… the DHR has to walk the extra mile to fill up these posts on a regular basis. One of the obvious ways to achieve this is to make the conditions of service and/or remuneration more attractive to ensure that appointed scientists are to stay in DHR instead of deserting,” the report said, also suggesting exploring a quicker recruitment process.
“…the committee takes strong exception to the posts remaining vacant for so long and, therefore, the committee recommends that urgent measures other than ordinary procedure be taken to fill up the vacant posts,” the report said.
The panel added that adopting stop-gap measures like contractual appointments to important posts of scientists is “totally unacceptable” and the “ad-hoc practice” should be discontinued.
Contractual appointments to such posts inherently require continuity for their effectiveness and the success of the tasks would be jeopardised by sudden departures of researchers, it said.
The panel took note of the department’s programme to attract non-resident Indians (NRIs), persons of Indian origin (PIO) and overseas citizens of India (OCI) serving abroad back to India but pointed out inadequacies in what is offered to them.
“India’s brain drain is caused by a lack of higher education options, research funding and facilities, pay and perks that are lower than global standards in both the public and private sectors and fewer opportunities in terms of career progression, especially in specialised fields,” it pointed out.
Other facilitative factors like an environment of equity, transparency, protection of ownership of genuine research outcomes, delayed systemic response, etc. are also contributing factors.
Acknowledging funding limitations, the committee said it is not convinced that a consolidated stipend of Rs 1.2 lakhs per month for three years for a selected researcher under the scheme is adequate to attract professionals from abroad.
It stated that DHR should consider keeping the window open to enhance the quantum of stipend, at least based on the project proposals presented and the remuneration received by the person in the foreign country.
The same flexible approach should be adopted in case of the quantum of grant, it stressed.
Further, it suggested that the department look into the possibility of involving the private sector that can contribute through competitive pay packages and promote such ventures through the public-private partnership (PPP) mode.
It also highlighted that India should prioritise research on understudied diseases in the country, such as cardiovascular, respiratory diseases, etc. along with research on public health, healthcare infrastructure and systems and implementation of clinical medicine.
The committee acknowledged the importance of the adoption of new technologies and innovation to develop new drugs and treatment methods, underscoring the importance of clinical trials to generate necessary data.
“The regulatory architecture now in place in the country is taken note of, however, the committee would like to emphasise the need to ensure ‘informed’ consent of the participants of clinical trials which should invariably include sharing of information beforehand about how the data generated out of the trial would be used or shared,” the panel said.
It is important to ensure that the participants fully understand the risks and benefits of a study, management of sensitive personal information and balancing the need for research advancement with individual privacy rights.
Digitalisation and sharing of patient information bear privacy implications that need to be addressed and fixed with appropriate provisions.
The committee noted that the government has taken a key step in setting up the ICMR-National Institute for Research in Digital Health and Data Science and entrusting it with the task of developing India-specific AI-based solutions for strengthening the healthcare system with an overarching goal of achieving universal health coverage.
The panel highlighted research in digital health and data sciences as one of the areas that can be prioritised for collaboration with domain-leading private sector organisations.
